Reviewed by: L’Organisation et l’action des églises réformées de France (1557–1563). Synodes provinciaux et autres documents ed. by Philip Benedict, Nicolas Fornerod Brian Sandberg L’Organisation et l’action des églises réformées de France (1557–1563). Synodes provinciaux et autres documents. Edited by Philip Benedict and Nicolas Fornerod. [Travaux d’Humanisme et Renaissance, N° DIV; Archives des Églises Réformées de France, N° III.] (Geneva: Librairie Droz. 2012. Pp. cxxx, 362. €106,00. ISBN 978-2-600-01603-2.) Studying the spread of the Reformation in sixteenth-century France has always been difficult due to the fragmented documentary record and muted historical memory of French Protestantism. The persecution, forced conversion, and expulsions of French Calvinists during the religious wars, the dragonnades, and the Revocation led to the dispersal and destruction of their temples and their documents during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. [End Page 349] L’Organisation et l’action des églises réformées de France (1557–1563) assembles a remarkable group of documents from the Reformed church in France at its apogee. Protestant worship had been illegal in France since the 1530s, forcing religious dissidents to flee or go underground. By the 1550s, however, communities of believers began to abandon their clandestine prayer meetings and openly worship in cleansed local churches or newly founded Reformed temples under the protection of convinced nobles. Jean Calvin published French-language texts and sent Reformed ministers into France from Geneva to further the evangelical movement. The number of Reformed congregations grew from a mere six in 1555 to an astounding 816 by 1562—only seven years later. This rapid growth excited curious religious seekers, alarmed Catholic observers, and contributed to the outbreak of religious warfare in 1562. Edited by Philip Benedict and Nicolas Fornerod, the collection publishes transcriptions of four main types of documents from this formative period of the Reformed churches in France: acts of provincial synods, records of Reformed churches, registers of local consistories, and related documents. Some of these documents have been published previously, but in disparate volumes and specialized journals. Collectively, these documents offer a fascinating institutional history of the early French Reformed churches. This critical edition provides a lengthy introduction and ample footnotes to contextualize the sources. Benedict and Fornerod emphasize the organization of a network of Reformed churches and provincial synods across France, which spread Calvinist doctrine and practice. The introduction analyzes the rapid formation of the complex system of national synods, provincial synods, colloques, churches, and consistories, extending the analysis of Benedict’s Christ’s Churches Purely Reformed: A Social History of Calvinism (New Haven, 2002). The editors also examine the liturgy and discipline employed by the French Reformed churches. Finally, the introduction provides an analytic narrative of Reformed political activism from the political crisis in 1560 to the outbreak of the religious wars in 1562, as the deputies of Reformed churches and synods sought permission to worship publicly, to build temples, and to present their confession to the king. The documents offer a collective portrait of the early Reformed church institutions in France—revealing an often divided and contentious community of ministers and lay leaders. The records of the national and provincial synods are filled with doctrinal debates, disciplinary disputes, and moral anxieties. This evidence reminds historians that Calvinist churches and congregations were not simply subject to the moral policing of their local consistories but also immersed in broader regional and national communities of Reformed believers. As humanities digitization projects proceed rapidly, many of the documents published here will undoubtedly soon be available online—and several of them already are. The main contribution of this volume is to collate and present a coherent group of interrelated documents on the organization of the French Reformed churches in a copiously sourced critical edition that will be useful for specialized [End Page 350] researchers working on the spread of Calvinism. The Reformed synodal system organized in France in the mid-sixteenth century would soon become the model for Reformed communities in Scotland, the Netherlands, and elsewhere. The editors’ valuable work should thus facilitate future historical research on the French Reformation, the outbreak of the French Wars of Religion, and...
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Jul 14, 2024
Tetiana Bulakh 
Open Access
